Villains hiding out in underground lairs, councils of war meeting at spotlit circular tables, bank vaults full of gold bullion piled high. The popular imagination of what these secret, off-limits places might look like has been shaped, more than anything else, by the dramatic visions of the late production designer Ken Adam.
As the creative mind behind seven James Bond films across the 60s and 70s, and numerous other movies, from Dr Strangelove to Addams Family Values, Adam dreamed up the look of nuclear submarine bases, mountain laboratories, hi-tech space stations, glamorous Las Vegas penthouses, and missile launchers hidden inside volcanoes. In doing so, he built some of the most memorable and influential spaces, not only in the history of cinema but also in the history of architecture, real or imagined.
